


short, sweet, and extinct

by jennyquill



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/M, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-01
Updated: 2017-05-01
Packaged: 2018-10-26 13:49:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10787931
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jennyquill/pseuds/jennyquill
Summary: lena meets jack while knee-deep in the lap of luxury, a stolen wine glass in one hand and a thousand dollar designer clutch in the other, the luthor corp banner hanging above her head like a deadweight.





	short, sweet, and extinct

**Author's Note:**

> karlena is life but these two were too sweet not to write a little sad something for.

  
  


.

  


Lena meets Jack while knee-deep in the lap of luxury, a stolen wine glass in one hand and a thousand dollar designer clutch in the other, the Luthor Corp banner hanging above her head like a deadweight.

“Is that suit velvet?” she asks him.

He looks down and runs a hand absentmindedly across the silky maroon fabric. When he looks back up at her, he smiles, the arrogant slant of his mouth from before somehow turning sweet.

“You’ve got to find a way to have some fun at these things, right?”

Lena laughs, the sound a little too loud for the intimacy of the gala. She claps a hand over her mouth and chances a glance over to her mother, who is silently launching missiles from her glare alone.

Lena clears her throat and barely contains a stilted eye roll. Jack watches her with small amusement. He thrusts a hand between them.

“Jack Spheer, CEO in training.”

Lena readjusts so that her clutch is under her arm and takes his hand.

“Lena Luthor, resident Luthor number two.”

He raises his chin. “Lex has told me about you.”

“All bad things, I hope.”

“Absolutely horrible tabloid stories, I’m afraid.”

She laughs again and it bubbles out of her throat. A waiter breezes by with a tray brimming with dark liquid in tall glasses. Jack grabs one of them, turns to Lena with a shrug.

“To fun,” he says and raises his glass.

Lena smiles.

“To fun,” she echoes.

  


.

  


“We’re friends, right?”

“Yes. stop asking me that.” Lena doesn’t look up from the code that she’s typing into her computer.

“Just checking.” She feels the bed rustle and the slide of paper and pencil. Her hands still over the keyboard and curiosity gets the better of her.

“Are you afraid I’m gonna find someone smarter than you or something?” It’s a joke. They joke all the time, so there’s no reason for the frown she finds on his face.

“Something like that,” he says.

“Stop that.”

“Stop what?”

“Doubting this. Us.” Jack’s eyebrows raise slightly at her choice of words but it will be another year until she realizes the weight of them. “We’re going to have a breakthrough any day now, I know it. All that saving the world crap, you know.” She ruffles his hair and delights in the face he makes. “And you’ll be here, saving it all with me.”

He runs his hands through his hair distractedly. “I don’t know why you take so much joy in messing up art,” he grumbles.

“Gotta have my fun.” She winks. Jack sighs, but there’s a smile threatening to fall and his frown is gone, so Lena doesn’t feel that bad. She reaches across and flips some of his papers around. “C’mon, pick up the pace now.”

“Yes, dear.”

She feels her cheeks flush and if Jack notices, he doesn’t say anything. They work in companionable silence until the sun disappears and the moon is hung high in the sky.

  


.

  


He kisses her first and it’s not a hard decision to kiss him back.

Jack kisses her like he’s wanted to since forever - which, now that Lena thinks of it, is probably not an inaccurate statement.

Lena kisses him back, presses into him, feels the overwhelming sense of _rightness_ wash over her and suddenly all the momentum they went through to get to this moment, all the longing looks and touches and double-meanings make alarming clarity in her muddled mind.

She laughs, lips breaking away from his, and she’s laughing hard, so hard and free and for the first time in a long while, she doesn’t feel weighted by the world.

  


.

  


“Bermuda sounds nice.”

“It sounds basic.”

“It sounds like you need a vacation. To Bermuda. Which, I believe is not basic, but blissful.”

Lena stretches above her head and groans when she feels the tired crack of her bones. She furrows her eyebrows at him sprawled comfortably on her couch.

“I have twelve hours to find a solution to this coding hack and you want to talk me into taking a vacation?”

He shrugs, eyes sparkling and hands clasped together over his knee. “Of course.”

“You’re impossible.”

“I’m insufferable.”

“That too.”

“So Bermuda?”

Lena sighs. Her desk is less of a desk and more of a mountain of paperwork than anything, her computer on the brink of overheating, her coffee cold and her attentiveness to the world waning. She glances at the clock, sees she’s got eleven hours and fifty-five minutes left when she knows that she can finish the job in three.

Jack’s moved to lying all the way back on the couch with his hands tucked casually behind his head. She stares him down and he stares right back until she breaks with a small huffy laugh.

“Not Bermuda,” she says and stands, walks towards the couch. “But I could use a distraction.”

He smiles triumphantly, and when she’s close enough he takes her hand to place a soft kiss to the back of it and Lena thinks that maybe, maybe a vacation wouldn’t be that bad either.

  


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“If I died tomorrow, what would you do?”

Lena tears her gaze away from Metropolis’s skyline. Jack looks out over the city and she can practically see the millions of gears that are churning in his mind.

“I don’t know,” she says slowly. “I don’t think about your death often.”

“But what would you do?” It’s not said with any hurry, only the honest strain of curiosity.

She opens her mouth, closes it. She watches his profile in the low light, searches for a sign. She finds none.

“Let’s hope I don’t find out for awhile.” She slides her hand over his on the railing and moves closer into his space until he looks at her. “I plan on keeping you for a long time.”

This at least gets him to smile. He wraps an arm around her and a kiss is placed on her forehead.

“I like your plan.”

“You should.”

Metropolis buzzes and busies and Lena closes her eyes, thinks of palm trees and crashing waves.

  


.

  


“You’re going to leave me.”

His words echo in the apartment with a finality that sets into Lena’s bones. She breathes deep, tries to find warmth but comes up empty.

“You could come with,” she says. There’s a lump in her throat and heat behind her eyes that threatens to fall at any second.

She turns to face him and realizes in her mistake the moment she takes in his face. He doesn’t look any better than her; hair disheveled, shirt wrinkled, eyes red and exhaustion in every limb of his body. Lena should fix this, should throw caution to the wind and just damn the consequences, but there is a time and place for people like Jack and there is none of that where she is going.

Instead, she shakes her head and lets out a wet, hollow laugh. “You won’t, though,” she answers for him, and if her voice shakes he doesn’t say anything about it.

Jack stares at her and she stares back and this time she wins, because he turns, walks slowly back down the hall and disappears into the living room.

It’s all the confirmation she needs.

  


.

  


The invitation to the conference is delivered by hand. She reads it over twice before putting it to the side, afraid that if she reads it too many times the words will rearrange themselves and the message that she’s so desperately trying to find between the lines will fade away.

Kara goes with her because Kara is a good friend. A _friend_ , Lena stubbornly tells herself.

And Jack, they could be friends, yes? Lena thinks that she is very much in need of a friend that she won’t accidently almost kiss on a daily basis.

She meets him for dinner at eight o’clock sharp, red dress on and purse slung over her shoulder, soft fairy lights illuminating the entrance to the restaurant.

“No more velvet suits, I see,” is the first thing that comes out of her mouth when she sees him and she instantly regrets it because it sets off something bright in his eyes, something that looks a lot like hope, hope that Lena can’t afford.

“Nope,” Jack agrees. “I left those back in Metropolis.”

Her laugh is dry. “Shall we?” she asks, body turning in towards the doors.

“Yes,” he says.

She moves to head inside when she feels him place a warm hand on her shoulder.

“Lena,” he says and it sounds like a question.

“Jack.”

His expression is so open it’s painful but Lena looks anyways, feels the old spell of the past pull her in.

“Thank you,” he says, swallows. “You didn’t have to.”

She smiles, lips pressed and memories fresh. “But I did.”

  


.

  


Supergirl stands in the corner of the lab, trying to take up as little space as possible. It’s a nice gesture, Lena thinks, but it doesn’t help her situation or the dull throbbing of her heart.

Behind her lies a swarm of metal bits, a testament to a project founded on youth and optimism, now dead and gone.

Jack is still warm when she places a shaky hand on his chest, just above his heart. Jack is dead and Jack is gone but his body is warm and if she focuses enough she can pretend that his chest is rising and falling with steady breaths.

His body is warm and Lena wonders if this would be any easier if she had found him hours later, stone cold and blue on icy tiles.

Jack dies right before her eyes and when Lena blinks she can see the code for the override branded on the back of her eyelids.

Lena Luthor saves the world once again and this time her thanks comes in the form of a stuttered heartbeat.

“Lena.” A murmur, accompanied by Supergirl’s strong hand resting carefully on the edge of her shoulder, afraid to touch, to interrupt.

She looks up, slowly, into a halo of gold and for a minute she wonders why the lights in the lab seem so bright. Supergirl’s brow is creased with worry and something that looks an awful lot like _care,_ but Lena’s gut clenches because she remembers a boy who looked at her with the same soft reverence.

Before Jack is carried away on the stretcher, she closes his eyes, sends a silent prayer up to a god she has trouble believing in, prays for a peace she’s never experienced.

Supergirl waits silently for her vigil to be over.

“C’mon,” she whispers, a far too intimate sound clashing with the brights of her suit. “I’ll take you home.”

Lena takes her hand, purses her lips, and allows herself to be carried off into the night.

 

 

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End file.
